OUR VIEW: Don't lower qualification standards for women in combat

Sunday

Jan 27, 2013 at 12:01 AM

There are 1.4 million active-duty members of the U.S. military. Close to 200,000 of them are women.

There are 1.4 million active-duty members of the U.S. military. Close to 200,000 of them are women.Those women have been prohibited from serving in ground combat units, although they have played support roles in combat areas where they have come under fire — and 152 female U.S. service members have been killed and more than 800 have been wounded during operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.Now, women will have an opportunity, if they so desire, to pursue actual combat duty.Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, stamping OK on a change recommended by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, last week lifted the Pentagon’s ban against women in combat. He said women have demonstrated their willingness “to fight, and if necessary to die” for this country, and should be allowed “to pursue every avenue of military service for which they are fully prepared and qualified.” We agree in principle, but the word “qualified” has to be the priority here.Each branch of the military must develop a procedure for allowing women to pursue one of the estimated 230,000 combat jobs that have opened, and will have three years to determine which positions they still should be barred from. Panetta insisted the qualifications for serving in combat will not be lowered.It’s been argued that women, in general, lack the strength and stamina to, for instance, drag a 200-pound colleague to safety while he and she both are clad in 70-odd pounds of protective gear, or hoist and load 90-pound artillery shells. So qualifying for basic combat roles is going to be a challenging assignment, let alone earning a place in elite commando units.Some also fear male soldiers will have an inherent protectiveness toward their female counterparts, causing distractions during battle. We’d hope that any soldier would have a colleague’s back just because it’s the right thing to do, and we question whether in the madness of combat anyone’s going to pay attention to a colleague’s gender.Some are uncomfortable with the notion of men and women being placed in such proximity, under the crudest conditions with zero privacy. We’d like to think these men and women are professionals who understood what they were getting into — and won’t be seeing anything new or unfamiliar.Some fear “boys will be boys and girls will be girls.” That presumes such urges are uncontrollable, even with bullets flying around (and remember our earlier comments about soldiers being professionals).Some fear the U.S. public will be sickened by honor guards unloading flag-draped caskets containing female soldiers off planes. As noted, that’s already happening.So do we favor women in combat? Again, we support the principle of letting people pursue opportunities, and we’ll say “more power to her” to any woman who makes the grade at any level here.We’ll have a problem, however, if few do, the commitment to maintaining qualifications ebbs and positions are created rather than earned. There has to be one set of standards — and let the best men, or women, prevail.

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